A paper lead-authored by postdoc Daniel Hooper is out now in Molecular Ecology where you can read about how ‘Sex Chromosome Inversions Enforce Reproductive Isolation Across An Avian Hybrid Zone’. This paper, focused on the hybrid zone in northern Australia between subspecies of the long-tailed finch (Poephila acuticauda), is one…
Postdoc Jen Walsh is the lead on a new study published in Evolution that leverages whole genome data from Saltmarsh and Nelson’s sparrows to investigate the genomic landscape of introgression between these species. By comparing populations in allopatry and sympatry, Jen’s paper shows that contemporary introgression is shaping the genomic…
Postdoc Jen Walsh co-authored a new paper in the Auk with collaborators from the University of New Hampshire looking at adaptive sex ratio manipulation in Saltmarsh Sparrows. The authors determined the sex of 990 offspring from 370 nests and characterized variation in site- and population-level sex ratios. They found no…
Just-arrived postdoc Daniel Hooper has a paper from his dissertation newly out in Nature Ecology and Evolution entitled Chromosomal inversion differences correlate with range overlap in passerine birds. Abstract is copied below, but his ‘behind the paper’ article in the same issue is also very much worth a read. Abstract:…
Grad student Stepfanie Aguillon’s paper is featured on the cover of the current issue of PLOS Genetics. Here is what that journal has to say about her contribution: Florida Scrub-Jays reveal new details about isolation-by-distance. The pattern of isolation-by-distance is observed often in nature, but we rarely have means to…
Grad student Stepfanie Aguillon’s newest paper is now out in the journal PLOS Genetics — where it was released just 1.5 hours before she gave a talk on it at the AOS conference at Michigan State. The paper titled “Deconstructing isolation-by-distance: The genomic consequences of limited dispersal” shows how the…
A paper resulting from Benjamin Van Dooren’s undergraduate honors thesis is out in the latest issue of Molecular Ecology where is is accompanied by a great commentary by Reto Buri. Ben did this honors project in our lab and went on to receive a Marshall Scholarship for his PhD at…
Lab associate John Sullivan and undergraduate Madi Rich, along with colleagues, published a paper this month in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society that describes a ‘lost’ species of electric fish from the Ogooué River of Gabon. A nice write-up on this project is on the Cornell Chronicle site…
Spurred by several exciting findings in warblers and canaries, current lab members Dave Toews and Natalie Hoffmeister, and lab alum Scott Taylor, reviewed what is known about the evolution and genetics of carotenoid processing in animals in a paper just published in Trends in Genetics. Animals cannot synthesize carotenoids and…
Graduate student Nick Mason recently published a paper with lead author Cissy Ballen to examine the effects of a campus support program for underrepresented minorities, first-generation students, and women in biology: the Biology Scholars Program (BSP) at Cornell. Together, Cissy and Nick found evidence of a disparity in preparedness among…
Postdoc Jen Walsh and collaborators recently published a paper in Molecular Ecology investigating the genetic structure of the Saltmarsh-Nelson’s sparrow subspecies complex. Using a reduced representation sequencing approach coupled with morphological data, this study offers the first comprehensive view into subspecies variation within Saltmarsh and Nelson’s sparrows. The authors found…
Postdoc Jen Walsh and collaborators recently published a paper in Conservation Genetics investigating the temporal stability of the Saltmarsh-Nelson’s sparrow hybrid zone. By comparing genetic, morphological, and survey data from the same sites from two time periods (1998 and 2013), this study finds that Nelson’s Sparrows are moving further south…
Graduate student Nick Mason recently published a manuscript on damselfly behavioral ecology that appeared in Animal Behaviour. Nick’s manuscript is the product of his time with the Cornell Florida Field Course, which facilitates short research projects for graduate students at the Archbold Biological Field Station in south-central Florida. In this…
Graduate student Nick Mason and collaborators recently published a paper in Evolution about diversification, rates of song evolution, and vocal learning in passerine birds. By combining two large vocalization data sets, this study finds a positive association between accelerated bursts in speciation and vocal evolution. Furthermore, the authors find evidence…
The well-read Molecular Ecologist blog by Jeremy Yoder — which is loosely affiliated with the Molecular Ecology journal — just ran a really great commentary featuring a new paper posted on bioRxiv by grad student and lead author Stepfanie Aguillon. The title of the original paper is Deconstructing isolation-by-distance: the…
You have to love a scientific paper where the Introduction starts: “Birds fly, whales swim, cheetahs run, and amoebae ooze (not very fast) via cellular extension.” This paper newly out in American Naturalist comes from work that Lab postdoc Eliot Miller and Lab scientist Sarah Wagner did in Australia in…
Congratulations to alumna Hope Batcheller for getting her undergraduate honors thesis all the way through to publication! Hope’s project on interspecific communication among ant-following birds in lowland Amazonia started with a semester-long directed reading seminar class on the existing research about ant-following birds, when then led Hope to design field…
Postdoc Shawn Billerman has a new paper out in The Auk based on his PhD work with his advisor Matt Carling (himself a former postdoc here) at the University of Wyoming. The punch-line of this study has to do with their finding that Red-naped Sapsuckers are more aggressive towards simulated…
Visiting scientist Luciano Caldarón, our own Leo Campagna, and a cadre of collaborators just published a paper showing that the European Turtle Dove shows genetic evidence of a fluctuating demography over time, and is currently undergoing a shrinking phase. The combined effect of demography, habitat destruction and hunting is causing…
Congratulations to Andy Johnson for persevering through the publication processs to see his undergrad thesis work out in a peer-reviewed journal. Andy spent two arduous summers in the high arctic putting migration tracking devices on Whimbrels–a first summer to deploy them, a second summer to get them back, and a…